1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to a pest monitoring device and method of imaging said pests arriving in traps set for the purpose of beetle monitoring. More particularly the present invention relates to a beetle sensing device providing daily gathering of images of the catch-can interior, thereby providing a remote real-time awareness of trap contents with reduced labor and increased accuracy and immediacy of trap condition as well as means of remotely recording data from both individual sensing devices and a plurality of said devices connected via a network.
2. Description of the Related Art
Pest monitoring is an established management tool to help protection crops, forests, and gardens against damage done by various pests including for example, beetles. Several beetle species which are pests of concern include the Bark beetles that attack conifers. Damage to, and death of, these conifers is done by these beetles burrowing in their bark. Particularly susceptible to attack are stressed trees. In the western U.S. and Canada conifers are presently under severe attack by the mountain pine beetle.
Ambrosia beetles feed on wood in various forms, including for example, live fruit and nut trees as well as on seasoning logs and/or lumber leaving pinholes which reduce the value of the lumber. As such they pose an economic threat to lumberyards.
The Japanese beetle is a truly vexing pest. The larvae feed on a broad variety of roots and the adults feed on the leaves of more than 250 important plants such as turf grasses, crops, ornamental plants, and vegetables. They presently infest the U.S. east of the Mississippi River. In addition, the risk of additional invasive beetle pest arrival is increasing as international commerce increases.
In response to such pest threats pest traps are used for manual monitoring of pest movement and population. Beetle traps are well known as a management tool to combat pest damage to agricultural, horticultural, forest and lumber resources. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,471,563 issued Sep. 18, 1984 to Lindgren teaches a trap for catching bark beetles and ambrosia beetles. Likewise, U.S. Pat. No. 2,020,283 issued May 10, 1935 to Armstrong et al teaches a trap for Japanese beetles.
More recently there have been efforts to automate the monitoring of pest traps including beetle traps as well as providing the ability to network a desired number of traps allowing for automated management of a plurality of traps connected into a single network. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,646,404 issued Jul. 8, 1997 to Litzkow et al, teaches a wired network monitoring system for a plurality of pest traps used in stored products. The traps in this teaching utilize light beam interruption for insects infesting stored grain products.
Similarly, U.S. Pat. No. 6,882,279 issued Apr. 19, 2005 to Shuman, et al, teaches the use of a wireless network monitoring system for a plurality of pest traps used in stored products using variously directed multiple beams to size the trapped insects.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,766,251 issued Jul. 20, 2004 to Mafra-Neto, et al, teaches a wireless network monitoring system for a plurality of pest traps to monitor arbitrary agricultural pests using arbitrary sensors.
The sensing method in these related art references utilize transmissive optical sensing having sensing passageways for falling pests between an LED emitter and a photo detector sensor which is located near the boundaries of, and horizontally and diametrically opposed across a section of the passageway. An arriving pest breaks a beam radiated by the emitter, casting a shadow upon the photo-detector sensor. Electromagnetic sensing is another detection approach taught in U.S. Pat. No. 7,218,234 issued May 15, 2007 to Tirkel wherein electromagnetic radiating and sensing elements detect pest movements of pests in a cavity.
One limitation of devices utilizing transmissive optics or electromagnetic sensing schemes is that they are “blind” and cannot identify arrivals or discriminate between arrival types, e.g. the harmful pest or the beneficial predator. U.S. Pat. No. 7,020,996 issued Apr. 4, 2006 to Beroza et al, strives to overcome this limitation by teaching acoustic signature identification of arrivals.
The present invention overcomes the limitation by daily gathering of images of a beetle trap's catch-can interior, thereby providing a remote real-time awareness of trap contents with reduced labor and increased accuracy and immediacy of trap condition. The images may be transmitted for pest arrival detection, identification and discrimination either by human viewing or by machines programmed to do so as described in U.S. Pat. No. 7,496,228 issued Feb. 24, 2009 to Landwehr et al.
Thus, there remains a need for a cost effective pest monitor with the ability to provide daily gathering of images of the catch-can interior, thereby providing a remote real-time awareness of trap contents with reduced labor and increased accuracy and immediacy of trap condition.